8 Tips for Writing Content

Online Marketing: 8 Tips for Writing Content That Ranks Highly

The rules have changed dramatically. Getting content to rank highly used to be all about SEO. Now, it’s all about the quality of the content. Here are eight tips for writing content that ranks highly in 2013 and beyond.

Write For Humans, Not Robots

Nine times out of ten, content written for SEO is inferior content. Average web surfers don’t like it, and search engines don’t either. For the most part, Google’s algorithms are a mystery to everyone outside of a small circle of Google employees. But all signs point to Google having a preference for natural content over keyword stuffed SEO content.

Write Catchy Headlines

Of course it’s the meat of your content that matters most. But if you don’t write catchy headlines to “hook” your visitors, some will not make it to the meat of the content. So what does this have to do with search engine rankings?

You need people to read your content and then link to it because they find it useful. Search engines still love links, so you need them to rank. Having a catchy headline is the first step to getting people to read your articles and link to them.

Use Sub Headlines and Avoid Long Paragraphs

Attention spans are now shorter than ever. You need people to actually read your content and link to it, so your content needs to be formatted in a way that doesn’t turn readers off. Using sub headlines, short paragraphs, and bulleted or numbered lists makes your content more readable. The more readable it is, the more likely it is that your content will be read and linked to.

Forget About Keyword Density

While it is important to weave relevant keywords throughout your content, focusing on keyword density takes your eyes off the ball. Your number one goal is to write naturally, and you can’t do that if you’re thinking too much about things like keyword density and placement.

Write Long, Detailed Articles

The more social media shares and backlinks your articles have, the higher they will be ranked in search engines. Articles with depth tend to be linked to and shared more often than short articles. However, you can’t just carelessly string together a bunch of sentences to make a long article. You must aim to provide real quality and value from the start of an article to the end of it.

Grab The Long Tail

If you have any experience in internet marketing, you probably know that one and two word keywords can be very hard to rank for. This is true now more than ever because more and more webpages continue to hit the internet every day.

Focusing on so-called “long tail keywords” is now of the utmost importance. “How to lose weight fast” would be much easier to rank for than “lose weight.” The added bonus is that long tail keywords tend to be more targeted and therefore they convert into sales better.

Answer Questions

Make a list of questions that people in your niche typically have, and write different articles to address these questions. These articles will be found in search engines, and these types of articles are very effective at attracting links and shares – provided you give quality answers to the questions of course. These types of articles can help your site rank because, if they’re well done, they’ll attract lots of links and social media shares.

Stay On Topic

Each website article should be tightly focused around one particular topic. Articles that veer off all over the place do not hold the attention of readers. If you want your content to rank highly, it must hold readers’ attention. Choose a keyword for an article, and make that keyword the focus of the article.

One Important Thing

It doesn’t matter how good your content is if your website gets slapped with SEO penalties. And how do you avoid that? Keep your emphasis on creating quality content. If you use any SEO tactics, keep it very light to stay in the safe zone.

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